Hero of the Union
The Hero of the Union award is an award conferred by the Sylvian Union upon individuals who have provided a great service to the Union, usually going beyond any standard personal duty. While the award's beginnings were rather tongue-in-cheek, rewarding spiteful, petty actions against Sylvia's enemies, the award has become rather prestigious, and is now given with great honor. It is currently the highest honor recognized by the Sylvian Union. The award may be given with or without honors-- typically the inclusion of honors implies that the recipient's life was lost during an extraordinary act of heroism. The Hero of the Union award can be awarded by either the Sylvian Consul, or by the Sylvian Parliament. Below is a table of all Hero of the Union recipients to date. More in-depth information can be found below the table. Recipients (with context) * Abstacious, at this time a Montrosian citizen, was awarded the Hero of the Union on the 21st of April, 2019, for, according to Sylvia, "heroically tearing down the dastardly DEInc tower in record time, preventing its resources from falling to less worthy projects!" ** Dinoking93 of Dinoking93 Excavation Incorporated had been banned from the server for xraying, and had willed his tower (which impeded on HUM's sovereign waters) to goomyman77 of Goomlandia. Refusing to allow the quartz tower (which stood in Sylvian territory) to be given to one of the Sylvian Union's most outspoken opponents, Abstacious quickly descended upon the tower and mined all the quartz out before goomyman77 was able to get to it, depositing the quartz in HUM. The quartz was used to build a monument in his honor in the Sylvian Federal Province, as well as being put toward various other quartz buildings in the area. * enbydrowned, another Montrosian citizen, was also awarded the Hero of the Union on the 21st of April, 2019, for their "great work of writing": "If anything is a patchwork, it’s Goomnest- a quilt of corruption sewn together by a barely effective dictator." ** This biting criticism of the Sylvian Union's rival came during the ensuing argument between Goomlandia and the Sylvian Union over the DEInc quartz. Goomyman77 had decried the Sylvian Union as inefficient and bureaucratic, asserting that "Sylvians have this complicated unnecessary democracy-not-democracy... you patchworked a bunch of nations together somehow." The response from enbydrowned gained such acclaim within the Sylvian discord that Consul GoatWhisperer decided to confer an award upon enbydrowned for it. * Abstacious and Argetlam04 were awarded the Hero of the Union on the 17th of May, 2019, when they went to explore the Eastern side of the map during the first worldborder expansion, despite Goomnest requesting that they keep to their respective sides of the map in searching for loot. The duo was discovered, and Abstacious escaped with his life intact, while Argetlam04 died in attempting to escape from a Goomlandian sentry. Argetlam04 recieved Honors on his award due to his death. * FlyingGMM was awarded the Hero of the Union with Honors on the 19th of May, 2019, when a travel ban on Sylvians was enacted by Goomlandia and FlyingGMM entered the country anyway. He was killed by Goomyman77 for entering the country. * The Sylvian Parliament issued a blanket set of Hero of the Union awards to all those who responded to Sylvia's call to arms against the First Northern Alliance (essentially just the Kingdom of Vailan) during the War of Northern Aggression. The parliament was forced to issue the award directly for two key reasons: one, this was the first time any non-Sylvians had ever received the award so it was thought best to ensure popular support, and second, Consul argetlam04 was essentially a lame duck, with motions for his recall being on the floor while this motion was also deliberated on. * boboismissing recieved a Hero of the Union award on the 8th of October, 2019, for using her artistic abilities to create a drawing of Mommy Sylvia, a Lady-Liberty-esque personification of the Sylvian Union said by FlyingGMM to be a "big tiddy milky mommy gf" to demonstrate the elegance and providing nature of the Sylvian Union.